


Wherever You Want It to Be

by wreckingthefinite



Series: Wherever You Want It To Be [1]
Category: Six of Crows Series - Leigh Bardugo
Genre: Belly Kink, Chubby Wylan, Fluff, M/M, Short & Sweet, Soft Wylan, Weight Gain, Weight Issues, but like really just a little chubby
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-05
Updated: 2017-10-05
Packaged: 2019-01-09 10:53:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12274935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wreckingthefinite/pseuds/wreckingthefinite
Summary: Wylan is soft and he really likes croissants.  Jesper is not soft and he really likes Wylan.





	Wherever You Want It to Be

Wylan has weird hangups about food.

It hadn’t been so noticeable at first, when they’d been constantly buffeted along on the winds of one disaster after another. Food had been just one of a list of requirements that had to be achieved quickly, minor inconveniences to be dealt with in a hurry so as to get back to the more important matters at hand: survival, revenge, kruge. 

Now, months later, all of that urgency is gone, and time seems to unspool before them, an unexpectedly long thread. Time that they have filled in large part like the teenagers they are—in idleness, in pleasure, in laughter and play and sleep and champagne. 

And, Jesper had noticed quickly, in food. 

At first, he hadn’t thought anything of it. They deserved rest, comfort, satiety—and if Wylan wanted that satiety to come in the form of stacks and stacks of waffles, takeaway curry, buttery croissants that left his pretty soft merchling hands greasy? Jesper was happy to oblige. 

It had even seemed sort of natural, maybe, that Wylan might have a penchant for gluttony. Rich son of a rich mercher, raised with an excess of everything. Why wouldn’t he be indulgent? 

It’s not that simple, though, a fact that becomes more and more clear as the weeks pass by. 

There’s the first time he hears Wylan rattling around downstairs in the kitchen, late at night and long after the staff have gone to bed, eating pastries and cheese and the chocolate covered cherries he likes so well. That in itself doesn’t bother Jesper—years spent in gambling parlors until all hours have given him a fine appreciation for a flexible dining and sleeping schedule—but the fact that Wylan smoothly lies to him when he returns to bed, mentioning that he’d gone down for a glass of water? That’s disconcerting. 

There’s the time that Jesper’s walking back from the Barrel and catches a glimpse of Wylan’s pretty red curls at a fish and chips stand across the canal, only to arrive back home forty-five minutes later and have Wylan inform him that he hasn’t eaten all day and they should go to lunch. 

There are the times when Wylan hesitates before reaching for his fork, or times when he eats far more than Jesper can imagine is possibly comfortable. 

Today, for instance, Wylan elects to spend the better part of the morning lounging in bed, eating pastries and rich, cream-choked coffee, sprawling out next to Jesper, occasionally flopping over onto his tummy and requesting that Jesper read parts of the newspaper aloud to him. 

When Jesper has exhausted all the news worth mentioning and set the paper aside, he rolls onto his side to face Wylan, just admiring him for a moment. He looks sleepy-soft and sweet, rumpled hair and drowsy eyes, the beginning of a double chin creeping around at his jawline. Wylan has always been soft, vestiges of pudge clinging to his hips and around his waist. In contrast to Jesper’s whipcord lean lines and angles, Wylan looks every inch the mercher’s son he is. And now, in the last few months, that has only grown more true. 

“What should we do today?” Jesper asks lazily, tugging Wylan a little closer, enjoying the feel of Wylan’s skin against his, the press of his body against Jesper’s ribs. Safe. 

“What, lying in bed all day isn’t enough for you?” Wylan props himself up on one elbow, peering down at Jesper, eyes sparkling. 

Jesper stretches theatrically, batting his lashes. “Lying in bed with you is one of the great pleasures of my life, gorgeous. But I thought we might venture out at least a little.”

Wylan leans over Jesper and grabs his pocketwatch from the bedside table, glancing at it. “It’s almost noon. So what, you want to take me out to lunch or something? That enough of a venture for you? It’s Saturday. No work today.” 

“We’re criminals, Wylan. We don’t keep banker’s hours.” That’s not entirely true, the part about them being criminals—with Wylan’s fortune, there’s no need to work in the Barrel anymore, although that hasn’t stopped Jesper from “freelancing” with Kaz from time to time. 

“But no, no work today. How can you be hungry, though, after all those pastries?” Jesper smiles and slides his hand, which had been resting loosely on Wylan’s bare shoulder, down to his tummy. It’s _soft_ , a pretty little pooch topped by a small, insistent roll of pudge under his pecs—which are also soft. 

Jesper hadn’t been in the habit of lounging in dishabille with Wylan when they had first met, but Jesper knows with some certainty that he hadn’t had quite this much tummy then. 

To Jesper’s surprise, Wylan’s porcelain cheeks flame up as red as his curls, and he tugs Jesper’s hand away. “I’m not,” he says too quickly, looking suddenly younger than his years. 

Wylan scrambles back down under the covers, pulling the sheet up nearly to his chest, and Jesper’s heart aches a little. 

“If you want to go to lunch, I want to take you,” he says carefully, as if Wylan is one of the explosives he likes so much. Volatile. Dangerous. 

“No, it’s—you’re right, it’s not like I need it.” Wylan’s voice is quiet, a little more posh than usual. He puts his proper Kerch accent on like a suit of armor when he’s nervous. Jesper hates it. 

“I didn’t say that, sweetheart.” Jesper reaches out and smooths Wylan’s curls back from his forehead. “I was just surprised. Where do you want to go?” He flashes a grin, the one he knows Wylan responds well to, the one that is mostly dimples and teeth. “Some proper mercher place with white tablecloths? Should I dress appropriately? Leave the revolvers at home?” 

Wylan smiles, but it’s wan. “You don’t need to take your revolvers to any restaurant, mercher or not, Jesper.” 

Privately, Jesper disagrees; if possible, he prefers to take them everywhere with him, strapped to his hips like an extension of himself. “So if I promise to leave them at home you’ll let me take you out?” 

“I really shouldn’t.” Wylan sighs, a long gusty exhale that puffs out his full cheeks. “I’m getting fat.”

Jesper schools his face into an entirely neutral expression. “If you want lunch, you should get it. Period.” He pauses, feeling again like he’s tiptoeing through a room littered with Wylan’s detonation devices. 

_Fuck it._

“You’re not big enough to be fat, merchling,” he says, propping himself up on one elbow and then plucking the sheet off of Wylan’s midsection and swinging one of his long legs over Wylan’s hips to straddle him—and to keep him in place for the conversation that he suspects Wylan will try to squirm out of. He reaches down and taps his long fingers on the pale, pale skin of Wylan’s little tummy. “Puppy fat, maybe. It’s nothing,” he lies. It’s definitely something—something soft and squeezable and infinitely interesting to look at.

Wylan’s cheeks flare again. God, he’s adorable. _Focus, Fahey._

“ _You_ don’t have ‘puppy fat.’” Wylan scowls at Jesper’s abdomen, as if the musculature personally offends him. 

“Well, I’m but a poor farmer’s son, accustomed to hard work in the fields,” Jesper says facetiously, applying a judicious measure of dimples again. “You, on the other hand, are heir to a Kerch fortune and need never stoop so low as manual labor.” 

Wylan frowns. “That’s the problem, isn’t it?” 

“That you’re intolerably rich? Truly awful. Keeps me awake at night.” 

“No—I mean”—Wylan stops, frowning some more. “I don’t know.” 

Jesper trails his hand over Wylan’s tummy again, even though he knows it’s probably risky. Something about this conversation—dancing around the subject of Wylan’s pudgy little belly and its sharp contrast to his own taut midsection—makes him feel lit up, risky and alive, like spinning the wheel on a night when his pockets are flush. 

“I thought merchers were supposed to be—ah—not skinny,” he says, and jostles Wylan’s belly a little. “Tangible evidence of your fortune and all that. How else will the rest of us know what a great success you are?”

Wylan opens his mouth, then shuts it, then opens it again. “But I’m not a success.”

Jesper promptly starts to rebut the point, and Wylan interrupts. “I didn’t—I don’t mean to be dramatic. I just mean—I don’t know. Maybe I don’t _want_ to look like a mercher’s son.”

Jesper considers this. “Well, sometimes it doesn’t matter what you want. I’m Grisha. You’re a merchling. Pretending it isn’t true—wishing it isn’t true—doesn’t change it.” He shrugs, moving both of his hands up to Wylan’s shoulders, pinning him gently against the bed and leaning down to drop a soft, careful kiss at the corner of Wylan’s mouth, lingering long enough to worry Wylan’s full bottom lip between his teeth for a few pleasurable seconds. “And if you want to eat croissants at three in the morning like a properly indulgent son of a mercher, you don’t have to lie to me when you come back bed.” 

Wylan gasps theatrically, squirming under Jesper’s grip. “You _knew_?” 

“I _did_ ,” Jesper says, mimicking Wylan’s scandalized cadence perfectly. “Next time just bring them back to bed, yeah?” 

Wylan lips twitch, clearly caught between a smile and a frown. “Or I could just not eat croissants in the middle of the night like a normal person.”

Jesper shrugs, recognizing when a strategic retreat is the best offense. “Let’s go to lunch. Should I dress like a gentleman or can we get fish and chips and walk down to the park? Is that too gauche for your mercher sensibilities, love?” 

“I suppose I can bear it.”

“How nice of you to brush elbows with us commoners.”

*

A week later, Jesper drags Wylan down to the empty kitchen one evening to make rolls and soda bread. It’s a skill he mastered at an early age, the sort of talent that children without mothers often acquire. 

They laugh in the warm, fluttering gas light, floury and sticky and standing too close together to prevent knocking elbows. When he teaches Wylan to kneed the bread dough, Jesper stands behind him, arms wrapped around Wylan and guiding his hands on the sticky ball of dough. "Like that," he says softly, his voice a murmur in Wylan's ear. 

When they take the rolls out, perfectly round and golden, Wylan props himself on the counter, legs swinging like a naughty child, and lets Jesper hold steaming rolls, heavy with butter and jam, to his lips. It feels intimate, the empty kitchen and the homemade food and the strange closeness of Jesper feeding him, the breathy laughter when Jesper’s hand slips and smears butter or jam on Wylan’s lip, when he leans forward and kisses it away. 

Jesper's an excellent baker, the rolls soft and light, fragrant with yeast and butter, and Jesper's hand shakes ever-so-slightly when he holds one up for Wylan like an offering. 

It feels, somehow, a little magical, in this quiet kitchen, and Wylan lets Jesper put roll after roll to his lips, neither of them willing to break the spell that falls over them until Wylan finally has to hold his hands up in surrender, his tummy bloated and uncomfortably full. “No more, I can’t,” he says, laughing still, mesmerized by Jesper’s wide eyes and wider grin. 

“Then come on,” Jesper says immediately, taking his hand and tugging him gently off the counter. “We’ll leave the mess for the servants—isn’t that what you people do?”

“I don’t know, I never cooked before,” Wylan admits easily, a little breathless from the taxing effort of eating far too many rolls and crumbly soda bread slices. All that flour and butter in his tummy feels it’s doubled suddenly in size, just from the act of standing up. 

Jesper throws his head back and laughs. “Spoiled merchling. Let’s go upstairs, come on.” 

“Not so fast,” Wylan groans as Jesper tugs his arm. “I’m—really full.”

“I know,” Jesper says, his voice dark with something Wylan can’t quite identify. Something that sends a little thrill up his spine nonetheless. 

Jesper clips his long stride to keep pace with Wylan’s slower, shorter one. 

In their room, Jesper tugs his shirt over his head in one fluid motion, revealing what seems like acres of smooth, warm skin. God, he’s beautiful. 

It’s hard, sort of, to pull his own shirt off now, in the face of all of that lean, strong musculature. Jesper senses his hesitation, though, and before Wylan can even register it, Jesper’s pulling the hem of Wylan’s shirt up. “Take this off, gorgeous,” he murmurs. “Please.” 

His tummy seems bigger than it should be, without his shirt to camouflage it, and Jesper’s hands land on it like a magnet. “You feel good,” he says, and by the way he’s squeezing at Wylan’s tummy, it’s clear that he means _your belly feels good_.

Wylan hums in agreement, taking a step backward and plopping gracelessly onto the bed. Jesper follows him down without missing a beat. 

“These are tight,” Jesper says, working a narrow finger beneath the admittedly stressed waistband of Wylan’s trousers. “Here. Let me help you.” He wriggles his fingers under the lip of Wylan’s rounded belly and tugs until the button comes loose—and the weight of Wylan’s chubby tummy pushes the zipper down as well. 

“That feels better,” Wylan admits. 

“You have red lines all over you from the waistband, look,” Jesper says, and Wylan obediently looks down at his embarrassingly round tummy. Sure enough, his trousers have left indentions in the pudge of his belly.

“Ghezen, I’m getting fat,” he says, because it’s just a little bit true but also because he wants to see how Jesper reacts to it. 

“We’ve talked about this, darling.” Jesper’s voice is mock-serious. “Puppy fat is entirely different than fat-fat, and it doesn’t count.” He pinches the softest part of Wylan’s tummy, the pudge below his belly button. “And this? Puppy fat.” 

“I’m not going to be able to fit in any of my clothes before long,” Wylan says, mostly just to be difficult. 

“How fortunate you’re the heir to a vast fortune, then,” Jesper drawls, patting Wylan’s tummy gently. “We’ll just buy you new ones.” He leans forward and bites at Wylan’s jawline, right where a soft little pocket of chub has taken up residence beneath his chin. “Now will you hush? I brought you up here to fool around.”

“You’re so smooth, Jesper.” 

“I know. Stop talking, merchling.”

*

Later, when the lamps are out and Jesper’s pressed against Wylan’s back, his long arm thrown over Wylan’s body, his warm hand cupping the curve of Wylan’s belly, Wylan clears his throat and speaks into the darkness. “So where’s the line between puppy fat and fat-fat?” It’s silly, but he needs to know. 

“Wherever you want it to be, honey,” Jesper murmurs, already half-asleep. “Wherever you want.”

**Author's Note:**

> This was my first little foray into the Six of Crows fandom--mostly just a dry run to play with their voices a bit--but I'm sure I'll end up spending more time here. 
> 
> Anyway, I will savor any and all comments and kudos like a fine wine, and if you also like chubby merchling boys and their tall dashing boyfriends, you should probably come hang out with me on tumblr. I'm [missjanedoeeyes](http://missjanedoeeyes.tumblr.com).


End file.
